


Inalienable Girl in a Big Wide World

by asuralucier



Category: Arrival (2016)
Genre: Abbott and Costello are mentioned, Background Ian/Louise, Birthdays, Family Fluff, Gen, Post canon, Spiders, Wordplay, parent child relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-18
Updated: 2019-10-18
Packaged: 2020-11-23 10:28:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,126
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20890616
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/asuralucier/pseuds/asuralucier
Summary: After her seventh birthday, Hannah learns a few Big Things.





	Inalienable Girl in a Big Wide World

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Syrena_of_the_lake](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Syrena_of_the_lake/gifts).

As Hannah crept quietly through the house, she could still see leftovers from her party: shiny big balloons untied from the dining chairs now floating near the ceiling, bits of blueberry birthday cake wrapped up in plastic wrap to keep away the ants and spiders (not that there were many). The first time she’d found one dangling from her ceiling, Daddy had told her it was because they lived in an old house, already filled with friends. 

(After that, Hannah had taken to naming her friends. Charlotte, Shelob, Joy, Nellie. Mommy had been a little annoyed at Daddy for one of those names and Hannah didn’t understand why.)

There was a burst of tinny laughter that drew Hannah’s attention to the living room. Hannah knew she shouldn’t be up, but the excitement of the day, still rushing through her like a waterfall, meant that it was hard to keep her eyes closed. Every time she did, the colors would come back to her in a wave and wake her back up. It wasn’t her fault in the slightest. 

“I see you, young lady.” Daddy’s voice carried easily to where Hannah was hiding, in the little corner of the wall where the archway led into the living room. “It’s way past your bedtime.” 

Hannah looked down at her hands; if she held them very close to her face, she could still see the faint lines of the flowery tattoo a very nice lady had drawn on for her during the party. The colors were fading, but she thought she could still see it, the big purple petals of the violet and wide green leaves trailing down her arm almost to her elbow.

Almost sheepishly, Hannah peeked out from behind the corner, and before she looked at her father she stared at what was on the big TV screen. It was black and white, and Hannah looked at it with a little interest. She didn’t know much about about black and white things, except that if she saw them on TV or a movie, Hannah knew that it was something old, even older than her parents. 

Another tinny buzz of laughter came from the screen and captured Hannah’s attention. There were two men on the screen wearing billowing suits and one whacked the other soundly on the head. There was a loud _boink!_ that made Hannah laugh, too.

“Shh,” Daddy put a finger to his mouth and then he reached for the remote to lower the volume. When he did, Hannah followed his gaze to where Mommy was sleeping next to him on the couch. She clutched a blanket close to her chest as she slept, like the way Hannah did sometimes. 

Hannah went to sit next to him on the couch, careful to not disturb her mother. “If she’s sleepy, shouldn’t she be sleeping in her bed? This couch is so lumpy.” She pressed her hand down on the cushion to demonstrate. 

“I think so too,” Daddy agreed amiably, settling an arm around Hannah’s shoulders. She pressed her nose against his armpit and that made him squirm. “But the couch has sentimental value for Lou. She wouldn’t have moved in here without it.”

(Mommy’s name was Louise, but Daddy always called her Lou. He said it was short and sweet, just like her.) 

“What’s senti-mental value?” Hannah asked, sounding out the words very carefully. 

“Hm,” Daddy was thinking. Even in the dark, with the low light from the television barely illuminating his face, Hannah could see he was concentrating. Daddy had what Mommy called a “very obvious tell,” the way that he would scrunch up his nose and puff up his cheeks like a squirrel with his mouth in a flat line. “Like, it means something to her, even if it doesn’t really make sense to other people.” 

“Like you?” Hannah said. 

“Yes, like me.” Daddy nodded. “Lou had this couch in college. First thing she ever bought. She didn’t even have a bed, so she slept on this. So I guess...” there was a little lilt to Daddy’s voice now, the way his voice got when he was trying to make things make sense. Sometimes, on the rare days when he worked from home, holed up in the back office, she’d hear snatches of that same lilt coming through the door. 

It always seemed to Hannah a comforting thing, that Daddy got confused sometimes. It meant that the world was still big, and that he could stay what he wanted to be, which was the same thing that Mommy wanted to be too: a student of life. Hannah was a student too, a rapt pupil in the second grade over at Woolridge Elementary. 

Hannah looked around the living room. The room was chock full of mementos. It was another word that Daddy had taught her when they were rearranging photographs (again!), mostly of Hannah when she was a baby on top of the fireplace. She worried about them running out of room, sometimes, but Mommy said that the house would never run out of room for Hannah. 

Daddy tapped the top of her head. “I can see that noggin of yours hard at work. What are you thinking about?” 

Hannah made a face and scrunched up her nose. “What’s a noggin?” 

“Your brain,” Daddy said. “It has a million gears inside.” 

Hannah looked down at her hands. She counted to ten on each of her fingers and then tried to imagine what a million would look like. Finally, she gave up and looked up at her father very somberly, mustering all of the million gears in her noggin. “How big is a million?” 

“Very big,” her father replied just as seriously. “Here, stand up.” 

A burst of quiet laughter emitted from the television. Hannah hopped down from the couch and turned her back to the screen. She twisted her head around for a second. “What are you watching?” 

Daddy glanced at the television. “Abbott and Costello. They’re comedians, professional funny people, sweetie. I like them a lot, and your mother fell asleep, which should tell you that she’s not...” He turned his hands flat, palm up, and wriggled it back and forth like a see-saw. 

“Not convinced?” Hannah said, grinning widely. As far as she knew, that was a big girl way of saying no, or that she didn’t really like something. Both Mommy and Daddy said it a lot, so that they wouldn’t get in trouble at the university. Mommy told her that the word for university in Chinese was actually ‘Big Learn,’ for learning Big Things, which always made Hannah giggle. 

“Anyway, I’ll convince her yet.” Her father sat up straighter on the sofa and leaned forward towards where she was standing. “Put your arms out. Straighten them way way out.” 

Hannah did, straining a little bit at the effort. 

Daddy reached out and tapped her on the wrist. “How many numbers do you think you can fit in there, with your arms stretched out? Do you think you could fit in a million?”

“A million what?” Hannah blinked.

“I don’t know, let me think.” Daddy put on his thinking face once more. “I don’t know, Hannah Banana. Maybe something small. You can choose. What’s something small?” 

Hannah looked around again. “Particles?” She knew she couldn’t see them, but only because because they were teeny tiny. 

Daddy looked impressed, and then looked a bit pained as he shook his head. “Maybe something a bit bigger than that. You have to let me have my point. Let’s make a rule. It has to be something in this room, that you can see.” 

“Penny?” Hannah said. Sometimes there were spare coins on the mantelpiece next to the pictures. She went and looked and there was a penny. 

“Penny it is. Could you fit in a million pennies when you stretch out your arms?” 

It was one of Daddy’s funny questions. Hannah didn’t mind them so much now, even though she used to mind them. She’d been little before, and now she was grown up. Seven was a big number, appropriate for Big Learning and it was even lucky. 

She thought about it and looked at both of her outstretched arms. First her right arm, and then her left arm. Hannah had to shake her head. “Probably not?” 

“Probably not,” Daddy agreed. “If I stood up and did the same thing, a million wouldn’t fit in my arms either.” 

“Could you try?”

“Sure. Daddy’s old though, he needs a minute.” Her father attempted to lift himself up from the couch with little success. He stuck out a hand in her direction. “Be a big girl and help me.” 

Hannah did. Daddy got up after a bit and looked at the couch. “I really don’t like this couch.” He frowned. 

“But it has senti-mental value.” 

“There’s that little noggin hard at work.” 

Now it was Hannah’s turn to frown, but instead, she frowned at her father. “If my noggin has a million gears, then I have a big noggin. You said a million was a big number.” 

“So I did.” Daddy stretched out his arms. “How about this?” 

Hannah squinted. “Nope.” 

“My girl has the biggest noggin.” 

Daddy sat down first, and then Hannah sat back down too. When she did, she felt her mother shift and went to crawl under the blanket with her. She might be grown up, but she was still tiny enough for that.

Daddy said, “Hannah.” 

But Hannah settled in anyway and felt her mother’s lips ghost over her hair. 

“What are you still doing up, dear heart?” 

“I heard the television laughing,” said Hannah, and felt Mommy smiling against her scalp. 

To Daddy, Mommy said, “Told you, you should have turned it down.” 

“Yes ma’am,” Daddy saluted her from where he sat and nudged her knee with a socked toe. “Actually, I’ll turn it off. It’s not my fault that you’ve got no taste.” 

“I like them. It’s just that every time I watch them I still get nightmares about Halpern and those awful forms,” Mommy said. “Do you remember? Just because we wanted to name the aliens, pretty sure half of those forms were made up.” 

Hannah peeked over the blanket to look first at Mommy, then Daddy. “I’m here too,” she announced. “Don’t forget about me! What are you talking about?” 

“Don’t be silly, my inalienable girl,” Mommy said. “We could never forget. You’ll learn about bureaucracy one day.” 

“But not today,” said Daddy. “It’s too late to learn about bureaucracy. It’s not even a fun Big Thing. I promise.” 

Hannah pouted, “What if I find it fun? Bow-ra-whatsit.”

“Bureaucracy,” Mommy supplied. 

It was a long word, kind of like senti-mental value, and Hannah squeezed her eyes tightly shut so she could concentrate. “I don’t even know what bow-ra-crasy is. You don’t know I won’t find it fun.” 

Both of her parents stared at her like she was some kind of alien, with an extra head, even though aliens only had one head and lots of legs. Kind of spidery. Mommy said, “Well.” 

“If you did, sweetie, you’d be a very special girl.” Daddy said, looking a bit like he’d suddenly eaten something funny. Earlier, Hannah had thought that he didn’t like her birthday cake. “But we’d rather you be inalienable instead. Right, Lou?” 

“That’s right.” 

Hannah said, “Of course, I’m not an alien.” 

Unlike a lot of kids in her second-grade class, Hannah knew very well what aliens were. There was a sketch of an inky dark circle with even smaller pictures sitting on it. Even though it was just a picture, Mommy said it was a language. The language of the aliens. It was the only picture on their mantelpiece not of Hannah and sat snugly between a baby picture and a quick snap taken of her before she’d headed off to first grade. She’d worn a bright red backpack and clean new sneakers. 

That suddenly seemed to Hannah like a long time ago, but both Mommy and Daddy assured her it wasn’t. 

“We know you’re not,” Mommy gathered her in close and adjusted the blanket so that it covered Hannah up right. “Inalienable just means you’ll always be here. No one and nothing can ever take you away. It’s one of my favorite words.” 

“Because it has the word alien in it?” 

Mommy laughed, “That too. Try to sleep, sweetie. You can stay here with us.” 

“Even if the couch is very lumpy,” Daddy added.

“_Ian_.” 

As Hannah closed her eyes to the touch of her mother stroking her hair, she felt happy and content. She knew that when she opened her eyes again in the morning, the world would be waiting, big and wide and endless.

**Author's Note:**

> \- Charlotte, Nellie, and Joy are from E. B. White's _Charlotte's Web_.  
\- 大学 (daxue) which means 'university' in Mandarin Chinese has several transliterations in English; one possibility is 'big learn.'  
\- Last, but not least, a huge thank you to my beta.


End file.
